Dickens and dinner served well by Elements company

Friday

Local theaters across the Cape are dishing up their standard holiday fare, but if you want to enjoy the season in a truly lavish way none will compare to Elements Theatre Company’s ...

ELEMENTS THEATER COMPANY PHOTO

WHO YOU GONNA CALL – There is no one that can help Ebenezer Scrooge, right, played by Brad Lussier, when he's forced to look at his own cold-hearted ways by Chris Kanaga as the Spirit of Christmas Present in the Elements Theatre Company's dinner-theater production of Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol.

A sumptuous Christmas Carol in every way

Local theaters across the Cape are dishing up their standard holiday fare, but if you want to enjoy the season in a truly lavish way none will compare to Elements Theatre Company’s spectacular dinner-theater production of Charles Dickens’ classic tale of redemption, A Christmas Carol.

Elements, the resident theater company of the Community of Jesus in Orleans, has a longstanding reputation for presenting first-class theater productions with sharp acting, creative sets and beautiful costumes. With this show, the company has piled it on even more by offering a sumptuous gourmet meal as well.

The 140-year-old tale of Ebenezer Scrooge is almost the most known Christmas story, surpassed only by the original set in a manger in Bethlehem some two millennia ago. The story of the begrudging skinflint scared straight by a series of visitations by spirits is done in many forms, from single-person shows to musicals; the story is etched in everyone’s mind like rime on a winter window pane. Offering a more detailed traditional adaptation than most, Elements’ A Christmas Carol sparkles like new fallen snow under the moon on a crisp, clear night.

Company artistic director Sr. Danielle Dwyer proves her stylistic expertise as she works in concert a huge cast numbering over two dozen, with many of her mainstays playing multiple roles so distinctly and convincingly that you rarely notice the quadrupling, tripling, and doubling of parts.

Playing one role and playing it magnificently well is Brad Lussier as the haunted miser Scrooge. Lussier brings his best as he displays the curmudgeon’s ungenerous resentment of Christmas. With mystical help he eventually warms and melts after seeing the error of his stingy ways and becomes flooded with joy by the play’s end.

In the role of the ghost of Scrooge’s seven-years-dead business partner Jacob Marley, Chris Kanaga sets the perfect tone for a night in which Scrooge will get very little sleep. Kanaga reappears as the festive Spirit of Christmas Present and also fleshes out a couple of lesser roles proving he truly is a man of many disguises.

Equally adept at multiple personalities, director Dwyer is a wonderfully ethereal Ghost of Christmas Past, a beguilingly plump partygoer Miss Rosie and a seamy charwoman to boot. One wonders if she isn’t in concealing attire in the lobby ripping ticket stubs as well.

Showing zest and zeal as Scrooge’s underappreciated clerk Bob Cratchit, Br. Stephen Velie is charming as the father and husband of his family whose youngest is the all-time poster child of the lame and lovable, Tiny Tim, played nicely by Jacob Ortolani.

Kyle Norman, as Scrooge’s nephew Fred, also does his job well as does everyone in every role in the cast.

Elements’ production succeeds on many levels. The acting and costumes are top notch. Backed with live choirs of carolers and exceptional special effects the show is a feast for the eyes and ears.

But speaking of feasts, the food offering just might steal the whole show. A three-course menu featuring turkey and rib-eye steak with all the exquisite fixings, finished off by an assortment of flavored trifles, rivals any five-star restaurant fare, all served on fine china by an efficient corps of attendants.

If that wasn’t enough the pre-show time is filled with a bright-sounding brass quintet performing seasonal tunes. All in all, it is a most enjoyable evening of dining and entertainment.

Elements Theatre Company’s A Christmas Carol will be playing Dec. 9 and 10 at 6:30 p.m. (dinner theater) and Sunday Dec. 11 at 3:30 p.m. For tickets or information call the box office at 508-240-2400 or at www.gdaf.org.

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